What do many highly successful entrepreneurs have in common? Many of them keep a journal. Now you may be thinking, I’m extremely busy juggling a million other things, how can I possibly find time to journal?

Once you see the benefits of journaling you just might be motivated to make the time. It’s a tool that will empower your life in unexpected ways and fuel your professional and personal success.

Here are seven reasons why even the busiest entrepreneur should consider making time to journal:

1. It is well known that visualization is a key to a successful business, or any success for that matter. How does journaling help you visualize? When you write something on paper you clarify and prioritize what you want. This process makes your ideas and visions more concrete, which helps you to achieve them.

2. By putting “pen to paper” so to speak, you engage your creative process. Creativity is a must for entrepreneurs if they want to stay one step ahead of the competition. Journaling can help you create new ideas, especially if you write down any thought that crosses your mind, without editing yourself along the way.

3. Journaling engages your whole brain. When writing, your brain is using the left side for the analytical aspects of writing, which frees up the right side of your brain for creative thinking. Journaling is a process that engages your whole brain, and many times new ideas are the result.

4. Journaling can help you with your self-confidence. When you write about a positive experience your brain re-lives the experience. We often tend to ruminate more on negative experiences. So write about a huge win in your business! Whenever you reread your entry you will be releasing endorphins and dopamine back into your brain giving your self-esteem a boost, maybe when you will need it most.

5. Journaling helps you to track your progress. Entrepreneurs are the lifeblood of their business. You’re constantly learning, adjusting and fine-tuning as you go along. You may not realize how far you’ve come! Being able to write down what you have learned and are learning can be a big motivator as you go through rough spots in your business.

6. Journaling can strengthen your self-discipline. It can be a struggle to sit down every day and write in your journal, and doing so requires self-discipline. But just like a muscle, the more you exercise it, the more you use it, the stronger it becomes. Forming good habits in one area of your life have a tendency to spread to other areas. You will find that your daily practice of writing will domino into the creation of other healthy habits.

7. Writing is a well-known stress reliever. Journaling can help you not only to express your feelings, but also to interpret and learn to work through them. Anyone who has tried to start a business knows that it can be stressful, but journaling could be your secret weapon to managing stress and improving your health.

So keeping a journal has many benefits, some obvious and some not so obvious. Just remember that patience is the key to being successful when keeping a journal, but if you make the effort you are sure to be rewarded. If you would like to learn other strategies that will help you achieve success in your personal and professional life contact my Portland OR/ Vancouver WA office for an appointment.